May 30, 2018

"Revolving door" is a phrase that describes the practice of legislators leaving public service and heading immediately for lobbying positions. Ethics laws in all but nine states limit this practice by setting mandatory waiting periods before a legislator may register as a lobbyist or engage in lobbying activites.

Among the states that provide for cooling-off periods for former legislators, 26 require a one-year gap between legislating and lobbying. Ten states, plus the Minnesota House, set the waiting period to two years [see next paragraph]. Two states provide for limits between zero and 12 months. Michigan prohibits legislators from lobbying for the remainder of the term that they would have served if they had not vacated office.

In fact, the Minnesota House language isn't statutory, the NCSL page states:

No statutory restriction on revolving doors in Minnesota statutes. The House prohibits former state legislators from registering as lobbyists within 1 year from the date they leave office. House Rule 9.35. The Senate and Joint Rules do not appear to have a similar prohibition.

President Donald Trump campaigned on "draining the swamp"--and his pre-election spiel included promises to slow down the revolving door on the federal level, according to an April 2017 article at NPR:

But Trump had a plan. Trump promised to impose stronger "revolving door" rules, which basically say an official cannot leave government and then start lobbying his or her former colleagues. He did what he said he would do: Set a five-year revolving-door ban for his appointees; it's in an executive order on ethics he issued in January.

He also said he would ask Congress for a five-year lobbying ban on senators, representatives and top staffers. (They currently face one- or two-year bans under separate House and Senate rules.)

If the president hasn't managed to affect this change, it was the winning vision before he took the oath of office. One could be forgiven for entertaining the fantasy that the conservative Peppin might adhere to that vision in the state-level , but perhaps all purity faded when her husband spotted the job announcement, as the Star Tribune Jessie Van Berkel reports.

The Minnesota House has a rule requiring members to wait one year after leaving office before becoming lobbyists, but it’s unenforceable and routinely ignored. Lenczewski will herself ignore it, saying she plans on registering as a lobbyist soon after starting at LGN.

Minnesota was recently given a D-minus grade from the Center for Public Integrity — and an F in ethics enforcement.

The F springs in part from lax oversight of legislators turning lobbyists, the "Revolving Door" laws.

The most recent case involves Rep. Ann Lenczewski. She has been a member of the Legislature for 16 years and chaired the House Taxes Committee from 2013 to 2014. She is resigning in December to take a position with the lobbying firm Lockridge Grindal Nauen.

But this is a bipartisan problem. While Lenczewski is a DFLer, former Rep. Jim Abeler, served as a GOP House member from Anoka for 16 years, only to become a lobbyist a few weeks after resignation. According to the St. Paul Pioneer Press, since 2002, 60 former representatives have taken lobbying positions.

A lobbyist is a person who is paid to influence legislators — encouraging them to introduce and vote for measures the lobbyist represents. They are private citizens influencing legislators in certain ways. They can provide information about bills the legislator will hear and vote on, and then try to encourage them to vote in a way that helps the lobbyist’s client. They may also give campaign donations.

Lobbyist positions can be very lucrative. And a lobbyist who is on a first-name basis with many in the Legislature is able to command a good salary. To reduce that temptation many states bar legislators from moving into lobbying. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, there are 33 states with a “cooling off” period between leaving the Legislature and becoming a lobbyist. In eight, the restriction is for two years. . . .

The Rochester Bulletin's Heather Carlson reported in Slowing the revolving door that the need for ethics reform had made for an unusual pair:

A Rochester lawmaker is backing a bill requiring a "cooling-off period" before former lawmakers can begin lobbying lawmakers again.

Rep. Tina Liebling, DFL-Rochester, is sponsoring a measure that would bar former lawmakers and high-ranking legislative staff from lobbying legislators for a year. The Minnesota House already has a similar rule on the books for lawmakers, but that rule is routinely ignored.

"I was told, 'Well, the ban only applies to sitting legislators.' Kind of a Catch-22 there," she said.

Liebling said her biggest concern is that a legislator who is tasked with working in the public interest could be offered a high-paying lobbying job by powerful interests and take it. In fact, she has personally refused to meet with lawmakers who have gone straight from their House seats to lobbying.

"I just think there should be a cooling-off period, and I think the public has a right to expect that," Liebling said.

And the liberal Rochester lawmaker has support from an unlikely political ally. Conservative Rep. Steve Drazkowski, R-Mazeppa, is a co-sponsor of the bill. He agrees with Liebling that lawmakers shouldn't be able to leave the Legislature and then immediately begin lobbying former colleagues. He is particularly concerned about lawmakers who resign their seats specifically to take a lobbying job.

"That's really shaky ground ethically for people who made that commitment to their constituents to serve and their constituents placed their faith in them," Drazkowski said. . . .

That was then, this is now. Peppin's departure has drawn little mention of the revolving door in the press. Perhaps we'll find some as we read more.

Image: What is this thing called "ethics" and what does it have to do with the Minnesota House?

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Fortunately, sharp-eyed editors in Crookston and Mankato were able to articulate the reality of the situation for both leaders. At the Crookston Times, in the far northwestern corner of the state, editor Mike Christopherson writes in Times Editorial - Insanity prevails in St. Paul:

It’s said that the definition of “insanity” is repeating the same action but thinking that at some point there will be a different outcome. That notion comes to mind in the wake of DFL Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton late last week vetoing massive tax and budget bills approved by the Republican-controlled Minnesota House and Senate.

So who’s most guilty of displaying such behavior, Republican legislative leaders who keep sending Dayton bills that he’s said repeatedly he’s going to veto, or Minnesota voters who keep electing all of these people to office, from both parties, to not do their jobs?

For as long as Dayton has been governor and for as long as Republicans have controlled Minnesota’s two legislative chambers, Dayton has made it clear that if certain bills were passed and sent to his desk in certain forms, he’d veto them. He said that again this session, but the Republicans wanted to be able to blame him once the session ended, so they sent him two enormous bills totaling around 2,000 pages on the last day of the session.

Republican House Speaker Kurt Daudt and Republican Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka said they were blindsided by the vetoes. They were not. They would have been blindsided had Dayton actually signed the bills into law.

Crookston’s state representative in St. Paul, Republican Deb Kiel, said this in her post-veto statement released by her office: “The significant reforms to address senior and vulnerable adult abuse I worked on all session are gone with this veto. Meaningful investments in education including more funding and measures to keep students safe are gone with this veto. Low-income working families who rely on federal child care subsidies are hurt by this veto. The first income tax rate cut in nearly twenty years and critical tax conformity are gone with this veto. It seems our governor has chosen to play a political game and the people of Minnesota lost.”

Aside from the year-after-year-after-year continued absence of bipartisanship or a willingness to compromise, by legislators from both parties, the root of the problem once again seems to be the legislature’s inability to get major legislative passed until the last days, hours, minutes and seconds of each session.

Just look at what the statement from Kiel’s office indicates near the top. It references Dayton’s veto of the “tax conformity/school funding bill.” Why are these two different yet important legislative items in a single bill in the first place? Why is the abuse of senior citizens and vulnerable adults that Kiel worked to get passed during the session part of a bill that’s almost 2,000 pages thick? Why is funding to help struggling license centers across the state included in this bill? Why is school safety funding in this bill?

Couldn’t a stand-alone bill be hammered out that helps tackle the growing problem of senior citizen and vulnerable adult abuse? Couldn’t one bill and one bill alone address the state’s need to conform with the new federal tax law? ...

Minnesotans may not be surprised that the Legislature and governor once again failed to reach compromise on addressing myriad serious problems facing the state, but we should demand change in behavior, if not the participants in this dysfunction.

The GOP-led Legislature didn’t take seriously Gov. Mark Dayton’s veto threats. Dayton didn’t consider more face to face negotiations. Minnesotans were the real losers in this political game.

At some point, one side has to give more than they feel is fair in the interest of getting something accomplished. Neither side was big enough to do this.

We attribute 90 percent of the problem to the GOP’s insistence on creating one large omnibus megabill, with everything from agriculture to education thrown together in a nearly 1,000 page bill that most legislators had a few hours to read. The bill was even more problematic because it contained both policy provisions and funding allocations. . . .

Putting everything in one large bill was a problem logistically. It’s going to be more difficult for everyone involved to absorb it. And given the distrust Dayton had for the GOP because of last year’s trickery — sneaking poison pill provisions in a bill at the end — Dayton was right to be suspicious of this approach.

The GOP criticized Dayton for not being more engaged. Dayton said he would have been willing to negotiate more if he thought Daudt was more serious and honest about the negotiation.

In the end, Minnesotans were the losers. No solution to the opioid abuse problem. No help for families whose elders had been abused by an unwatched and unregulated industry. No money for enhanced school safety.

We urge voters to replace those responsible for this dereliction of duty.

If Republican leadership is 90 percent of the problem, Minnesota won't just have a new governor in 2019, but a seismic shift in the House and Senate. A sea of fresh faces in the House would be a good thing.

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May 29, 2018

The Duluth News Tribune minced no words in its editorial, Lawmakers sentence Minnesotans to death, but Tony Albright, R-Prior Lake, glibly excused the Republican-controlled House for failing to bring a bill to the floor of the Minnesota House that would ban the use of hand-held phones and other devices while driving.

Albright's excuse occurred during an episode of Your Legislators, a public affairs show on Pioneer Public Television. As South St. Paul Democrat Rick Hansen observed in the episode (Youtube below), "The carnage will continue."

The heartlessness is a bit hard to fathom. Legislative leaders in St. Paul this session listened to tragic tales from fellow Minnesotans, had a bill before them to prevent more tragedy, and then did nothing.

By preventing a vote on the House floor, lawmakers essentially sentenced to death 53 Minnesotans this coming year. That's the number of fatal crashes annually reportedly preventable with a state ban on the use of handheld cell phones and other electronic devices while driving. In 15 states that already have hands-free laws, fatal crashes related to the use of electronics behind the wheel dropped 16 percent within two years, according to the Minnesota Safety Council.

No wonder Georgia jumped at the chance to become the 16th state with such a law just this month. And no wonder Minnesota's measure enjoyed broad bipartisan support for much of this legislative session; its 40 authors included DFLers and Republicans alike.

But then, inexplicably, the measure just died — for a fourth straight session, its sponsors and supporters reported this week. Frustratingly, the bill had life only days ago. Its passage through committee this year was a first, clearing the way for a floor vote in the House that never came.

He was far from alone. A recent poll by the Minneapolis newspaper found an overwhelming nearly 80 percent of Minnesotans in support of banning handheld cell phones while driving. It's certainly annoying: that guy crawling along at 40 mph on the freeway, his phone pressed to his ear or that woman at the stop sign, so engrossed in her conversation she doesn't realize it'll never turn green. For too many Minnesotans, though, like Tom Goeltz, the issue is more tragic and serious. Goeltz's pregnant 22-year-old daughter was killed by a distracted driver in February 2016.

Yet "(lawmakers) say, 'Let's put it off for another year.' They are playing Russian roulette," Goeltz said in Monday's Star Tribune.

They're playing and losing. According to the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, distracted driving accounts for one out of every four motor vehicle deaths. Nationally, every year, approximately 421,000 people are hurt in crashes involving distracted drivers, 330,000 of those the result of texting and driving, according to AAA and other sources. Every day, 11 teenagers die from texting and driving; 21 percent of teen drivers in fatal accidents were on their cell phones.

A traffic-safety program in Minnesota called Toward Zero Deaths disturbingly determined that 94 percent of teens know the dangers of texting and driving — but 35 percent do it anyway.

In Minnesota, about 330 fatal accidents a year involve handheld phones and other devices. If we reduced that by the same 16 percent as other states with hands-free laws, that'd be 53 fewer fatals. Every year.

But not this coming year. Not with lawmakers in St. Paul, through heartless inaction, turning their backs on safety — and on 53 fellow Minnesotans whose death sentences they could have canceled.

If you appreciate our posts and original analysis, you can mail contributions (payable to Sally Jo Sorensen, 600 Maple Street, Summit SD 57266) or use the paypal button in the upper right hand corner of this post. Those wishing to make a small ongoing monthly contribution should click on the paypal subscription button.

May 27, 2018

As many readers know, Bluestem's proprietor is a vegetable gardener; with our move to Summit, we've also picked up a lovely old flower garden and an orchard of native fruits. With the late departure of winter and the sudden onset of summer temperatures, we find ourselves a bit busy this weekend.

Regular posting will resume on Tuesday.

In the meantime, find a local commemoration tomorrow to honor those who gave all to the service of this country.

May 25, 2018

On April 12, 2018, Lake Crystal area farmer and former congressional candidate Greg Mikkelson testified before the Minnesota House Ag Policy Committee about his experience with compliance with the state's buffer. He told a tale of woe, including material about a county employee who feared for his job and a welter of issues. Indeed, Mikkelson worried that he wasn't contacting the right agency.

Mikkelson called for the elimination of the Board of Water and Soil Resources in his testimony.

Not quite the case, the Blue Earth County Soil and Water Conservation District commissioners said in a recent letter to the House committee. Here's the letter for the record that the district board sent to members of the Ag Policy Committee:

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Republican leadership attempts to use lottery money to pay bond obligations on wastewater treatment facilities and landfill reclamation. These uses of Trust Fund dollars are not allowed under statute, Wagenius points out in her letter to the governor.

Lawmaker and lawyer Wagenius outlines the statutory case against the items, as well as pointing out the violation of the will of Minnesota voters who twice decided that they wanted the money to be spent on--and where they didn't want the money spent.

How clever Kurt Daudt and Paul Gazelka are, the Legislature’s head honchos.

Daudt, the Republican House speaker, and Gazelka, the Republican Senate majority leader, waited until the final hours of the recent legislative session to abscond with money from the Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund (ENRTF).

They succeeded. So far.

Recall that Minnesota voters created the state lottery in 1988 by constitutional amendment with the intent of dedicating a significant portion of proceeds to protect and enhance the environment.

Key to lottery money allocation is the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR), which reviews hundreds of proposals each year before submitting a finalist list to the Legislature to be funded by the ENRTF.

For the session just ended, commission members — 17 in all: five from the House, five from the Senate and seven citizens — had $46 million to allot and proposed funding for 67 projects.

Typically, these appropriations glide through the Legislature. And for good reason. The LCCMR process — the seven citizens are volunteers — is deliberative and time consuming. No one would submit willingly to this work knowing in the end legislators would dramatically alter their recommendations.

But not only that ...

In an unprecedented move and contrary to what Minnesota voters approved when they voted for the lottery, legislators this session cooked up a plan for the ENRTF to pay obligations on bonds the state will issue to fund Republicans’ pet lottery-funded projects.

Until now, lottery money has funded environment projects on a pay-as-you-go basis, which leaves the LCCMR flexible as varying threats and needs arise. Example: Most invasive species that today threaten Minnesota waters weren’t on anyone’s radar in 1988.

Now, if the Legislature gets away with its bonding scheme, the ENRTF will be obligated for years ahead to pay for projects approved this year.

What’s more, by reducing funding for projects from amounts proposed by the LCCMR and wiping out other projects entirely, Republicans made a banana-republic-like laughingstock of the appropriation process. . . .

Read the rest at the Star Tribune--then email or call the governor and politely ask for line-item vetoes of provisions in the bonding bill that violate statute and the expressed will of the people of Minnesota.

It's not as if there isn't a legal means to bond for these projects: as Anderson points out "bonding from the more appropriate general fund."

Logo: Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund (ENRTF).

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Minnesota's students deserve better than the @mngop's latest school funding gimmick that is tied to the tax bill, includes no new money and allows districts to raid teacher professional development funds. Do better. #mnlegpic.twitter.com/FMtZEcBMZx

*Correction: Education Minnesota sent a letter to the Governor, not a press release. Our mistake entirely. Apologies to the union.

Screengrab: From Education Minnesota's twitter account.

If you appreciate our posts and original analysis, you can mail contributions (payable to Sally Jo Sorensen, 600 Maple Street, Summit SD 57266) or use the paypal button in the upper right hand corner of this post. Those wishing to make a small ongoing monthly contribution should click on the paypal subscription button.

May 21, 2018

The move comes on the heels of a last-minute resolution by the House Ag Policy Committee to block the implementation of the nitrogen rule developed by the Minnesota Department of Agriculture under the Groundwater Protection--if Dayton vetoed the bill. The thought was to pressure Dayton into signing the bill in order to save the rule.

The House Agriculture Policy Committee adopted a resolution Sunday that may block a controversial groundwater protection rule from taking effect until the end of next year’s legislative session.

The resolution relies on a state statute signed into law by former Gov. Jesse Ventura in 2001 that has never before been used. It allows standing committees in the House and Senate, “with jurisdiction over the subject matter of a proposed rule” to prohibit an agency from adopting the rule “until the legislature adjourns the annual legislative session that began after the vote of the committee.”

The resolution approved Sunday may still allow for that compromise. One of its clauses requires the committee chair to satisfy the statute’s “notification and publication” requirements.

Rep. Paul Anderson (R-Starbuck), chair of the committee, said he would offer Dayton whatever assurances are needed that he would not make the necessary notifications if the governor agrees to sign the standalone omnibus agriculture finance bill, HF4133, which has already been passed by the Legislature. It contains language supported by Anderson that would return control of the soil loss index from the Board of Water and Soil Resources to the counties.

“It has been my hope the governor would compromise with us and sign the ag policy bill,” Anderson said. “It’s my intention to give him as much time as he needs.”

Republican committee members said delaying the rule is necessary in order to allow further public input and to ensure lawmakers have the final say before it goes into effect.

But DFL members of the committee say the rule has received years of input and invoking the statute is a political move that could have long-lasting impact if it sets a precedent where legislative committees begin overriding the rulemaking process.

While the committee met repeatedly over the weekend to consider the evolving resolution, the political motive became most explicit in the final gathering. Here's the Youtube of that moment when clean drinking water for rural Minnesota was sacrificed in an attempt to block anti-soil erosion efforts.

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May 20, 2018

Early this Sunday morning, the Minnesota House passed the infamous Omnibus Prime bill, nearly 1000 pages of the good, the bad and the fugly, released a couple of hours before members were asked to vote on it. Typical of the tweets responding to this situation:

The challenge from the Tea Party in the early Obama administration was "read the bill," but now that Republicans have power, that populous call seems to have gone by the wayside. Representative Rick Hansen, DFL-South St. Paul, rose to address the seeming lack of accountability to the public during the session, pointing out that change is coming.

(Aside: Bluestem's editor uses an alternative version: "Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by incompetence;" of course, it's the thought that counts. After all we've covered Jeff "Goose Poop" Backer long enough to know this).

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. . . .As we've received this large bill, I've been going through the pages and it's quite a task.

And as I 've been going through these pages I was remembering -- and I guess I'm old enough to remember now when we had a DFL majority in the house and we ended ahead of time. Finished our work and adjourned before the end.

But for the last four years under Republican control we have had a train wreck at the end of every session-- [20]15, [20]16, [20]17, and now [20]18-- but this one takes the cake.

This isn't all of it.

Now, I get asked why does this happen? Why does this happen? Why do you wait until the end and I say we don't have to wait until the end. It's a choice.

Now, I generally go by a belief that never attribute to conspiracy what can be explained by incompetence, but this isn't incompetence this is a choice to put stuff in here.

The Majority Leader [Joyce Peppin] ,,,just essentially was challenging us as if this is a campaign; not governing-- challenging the minority about pieces that are in here which we acknowledged are good that we'd like to vote for because they're good and they'd pass--they'd probably pass unanimously.

She was addressing the members...in the minority. Why don't we address Minnesotans? I hope everybody gets a copy of this [omnibus bill] and can take it on the road. Take it home. Bring it to our constituents. Those of us who aren't staying bring it home as a memento.

Bring it to your constituents and see how proud they are of it. I bet you're going to find out they're not very proud of this. Minnesotans aren't looking for this. They're looking for items that are in here that we could pass but by putting the good stuff in with the junk into this at the end.

Oh and we knew this was going to happen didn't we at the end. We came in on February 20th we could have started taking some of these things. We did one emergency thing for MNLARS.

I remember when we used to do it several things. When we used to bring bills ahead of time throughout this session--bipartisan bills--instead of waiting til the end.

This is a choice.

It's a choice of this management of this house for the last four years. Speaker Daudt's majority always waits till the end, and it always results in a mess. And the party of personal responsibility blames the governor oh it's the governor's fault. It's the governor's fault.

I don't know how many task forces are in here. I don't know how many working groups. Representative Baker, you referenced the special interests. They've written into this bill. Some are very happy because in here we give that responsibility to them rather than doing the job that people elect us to do. So we should vote against this.

I was going to speak on the concurrence but these votes don't seem to change during the debate. Don't see a lot of debate. We used to see a lot of debate we used to see actual discussion. It's my understanding when this was discussed in the [conference] committee last night, people just came in and voted.

So where was the real discussion? Where were the real decisions made? Who made them? Why?

Maybe it's just a function of power that when people have power for awhile, they assume that's gonna last forever and they become arrogant and that arrogance leads to mistakes leads to errors. . .

I'll address our side of the aisle that if we get power again we cannot be doing this stuff. We cannot be doing this stuff! We have to do it differently.

I think Minnesotans are watching and I think change is coming.

Finally a tweet that sums it up:

.@reprickhansen Peppin was addressing minority members as if this was a campaign. Why don't we address Minnesotans? Putting good stuff in with junk doesn't provide Minnesotans with what they need. Why wait to the end? Party of personal responsibility blames gov #mnleg#mnhouse

*We've swapped out the MNHouse Info clip with start and stop commands for this more immediately viewed clip from the DFL House Caucus's channel.

Photo: A train wreck, the metaphor Hansen chose to describe four years of Minnesota House sessions under Speaker Daudt's leadership. Blaming the governor is the MNGOP deflection tactic.

If you appreciate our posts and original analysis, you can mail contributions (payable to Sally Jo Sorensen, 600 Maple Street, Summit SD 57266) or use the paypal button in the upper right hand corner of this post. Those wishing to make a small ongoing monthly contribution should click on the paypal subscription button.

May 19, 2018

Will the members of the Republican Farmer Labor Caucus in the Minnesota House sign on as co-authors of legislation that would would enshrine Minnesotans’ right to collectively bargain for good jobs, wages and benefits into the state’s constitution?

Representative Rick Hansen (DFL-South St. Paul) and Senator Matt Klein (DFL-Mendota Heights) today introduced legislation that would enshrine Minnesotans’ right to collectively bargain for good jobs, wages and benefits into the state’s constitution (Senate File 4083). If approved by the Legislature, the constitutional amendment would appear on the ballot this year

“Generations of Minnesotans have fought to improve working conditions, gain fair pay and benefits, and to ensure a secure retirement,” remarked Rep. Hansen. “Minnesotans expect us to make sure they continue to have the right to come together and bargain collectively. It's unfortunate this amendment is necessary, but Republicans' attacks on working Minnesotans are making it clear we need to act to safeguard hard working Minnesotans from attacks on their livelihood.

“Rep. Rick Hansen and I are committed to protecting the right of Minnesota workers to negotiate for their wages and benefits,” said Sen. Klein. “This constitutional amendment would ensure that our state stands strong for workers today and into the future. Minnesota can only stay great if we have a strong middle class, built of working families in every community.”

The amendment proposed by Rep. Hansen and Sen. Klein would appear on the 2018 ballot as follows:

Shall the Minnesota Constitution be amended to:

(1) grant public and private employees the constitutional right to organize and bargain collectively through labor unions;

(2) invalidate existing or future state or local laws that limit the ability to join unions and bargain collectively, and to negotiate and enforce collective bargaining agreements, including employees' financial support of their labor unions; and

(3) override state laws that regulate hours and conditions of employment to the extent that those laws conflict with collective bargaining agreements?

Yes

No

Bluestem eagerly looks forward to the members of the RFLC signing on as co-authors of the pro-labor legislation.

Image: We just like this picture of when pigs fly. It's not an editorial comment. Moreover, the pigs are not feral swine.

If you appreciate our posts and original analysis, you can mail contributions (payable to Sally Jo Sorensen, 600 Maple Street, Summit SD 57266) or use the paypal button in the upper right hand corner of this post. Those wishing to make a small ongoing monthly contribution should click on the paypal subscription button.

The House Agriculture Policy Committee gathered Saturday to consider using, for the first time, a 17-year-old state statute that would allow it block a controversial groundwater protection rule proposed by the Department of Agriculture earlier this year.

However, after passionate objections that had as much to do with the procedure as the policy, the committee decided to adjourn and postpone action until a noon meeting Sunday in hopes a compromise agreement can be reached.

The story contains an inaccuracy, as it fails to note the second draft of the rule was introduced in late April. See Josephine Marcotty's story, Overuse of farm fertilizer drives Minnesota’s first effort to regulate it.

And here's the video from the first meeting of the committee before several recesses:

Here's the second part:

And part 3:

UPDATE: After a recess, Anderson declares that since this is a committee resolution, there's no need to have public testimony and when they return from another recess, the resolution but not the rule will be discussed. Mahoney suggests that since "we know how this will go," that Anderson should just call for a vote.

It's not the dark of night, but it is after 5:30 on a Saturday afternoon. The only consolation for Minnesotans who want clean drinking water may be the optics of this hearing. The Republicans aren't looking pretty. We'll add the video as soon as House Info staff load it on YouTube. [END UPDATE]

As we post this, the House Agriculture Policy Committee is meeting to delay adoption of the Minnesota Department of Agriculture's proposed Groundwater Protection Rule pursuant to Minnesota Statute section 14.126. This takes away the ability of the Minnesota Department of Agriculture to implement the long-under-development rule to protect groundwater from nitrogen pollution.

The Dept. of Agriculture this past week released the second draft of its controversial Nitrogen Management Plan. Originally, they had planned to make it public in mid to late May, but pushed up the release date due, at least in part, to strong pressure from legislators and farm groups. An 80-day comment period starts this week, followed by a series of informational meetings around the state. After that, an administrative law judge will either accept or reject the rule or suggest changes. When all these steps have been completed, Gov. Mark Dayton could be signing the rule by December. . . .

Minnesota water advocates gathered at the Capitol for their annual Clean Water Action Day when at least one water controversy seems to be easing.

House Agriculture Chairman Paul Anderson, R-Starbuck, on Wednesday said that farmers now pretty much accept a Dayton administration draft rule on nitrogen fertilizer, although he said they still do not trust the administration.

Hundreds rallied in favor of clean water Wednesday, talking about issues such as sulfate in wild rice water and construction of an oil pipeline across northern Minnesota.

But the latest agriculture water controversy was subsiding.

Gov. Mark Dayton and key agriculture aides are working on cutting the use of nitrogen fertilizer, which results in nitrates entering water. They have a draft rule to ban its fall application in much of Minnesota.

After looking over the latest draft rule, which could be made permanent later this year or early in 2019, Anderson said most of his concerns have been fixed.

Although Chair Anderson wanted to runcounter to House rules and not allow public testimony on the resolution--now he has agreed to allow public testimony after the House recesses this evening. It's shaping up to be a "dark of night" committee hearing. Or maybe not, as the committee has briefly recessed after Anderson blathered about "the power of the committee."

Here's Governor Dayton's letter to the committee leaders objecting to the move.

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Area counties are concerned a recent decision by a Minnesota Tax Court regarding Enbridge Energy's oil pipeline system could leave them paying out potentially large refunds to the company.

On Tuesday, tax court Judge Joanne Turner ruled the Minnesota Department of Revenue had overvalued Enbridge's pipeline system that runs through 13 Minnesota counties by $3.2 billion from 2012-2014.

While pipelines are assessed by the state, tax proceeds go to the counties. As a result, there's a potential the counties may have to refund large sums of money to Enbridge. ...

Stevenson said, with the appeals process, the matter could take another year or two to be settled. However, when it the final ruling is made, Stevenson added that townships might be hit more hard than counties.

"Something that's not being talked about as much is the impact on townships," Stevenson said. "We have a couple townships in Cass that could be put under by this, because half of their valuation is just on pipelines. The townships just have the numbers stacked against them, they're not financially set up to handle something like this."

The House passed a proposal Monday that would give the green light to Enbridge to build a controversial pipeline across northern Minnesota, a month before the Public Utilities Commission makes its decision on the project.

Fabian said the pipeline would be a “tremendous asset” to the state, adding his bill has “very, very strong support in my part of the state” and across northern Minnesota.

One of the things supporters of the bill also touted were those tax payments. Here's the entire debate:

At the 22:37 mark, Mike Sundin, DFL-Esko, brings up the then-pending court case and tells the bill's author that Enbridge isn't a benevolent entity devoted to making Minnesota counties flush. Looks like the guy was on to something--and then there's potentially a bill for townships as well.

Photo: A stock image from Enbridge.

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May 15, 2018

The Minnesota's House will take up SF3367 today, a bill whose House author is Anoka Republican Abigail Whelan, who is retiring at the end of the session.

The bill, which will require lodging facility employees to be trained to recognize sex trafficking, enjoys bipartisan authorship in the chamber, from the conservative Whelan to Apple Valley's progressive DFL Erin Maye Quade. The senate language replaces the original House bill, which Whelan and a bi-partisan group of representatives support.

Bluestem is struck by another aspect of the Huizenga rant against the bill, so much so that we wonder if the entire matter is simply an elaborate troll. He began his post:

Why do Republicans in Minnesota write this kind of stuff? Don't they realize they are adding unnecessary costs and burdens into the private sector, a tangible outcome, in the hopes of reducing loosely defined sex trafficking (intangible outcome), a problem that didn't exist in MN prior to all of this sanctuary city, Islamist immigration? What is the purpose of this bill?

The notion that sex trafficking didn't exist in Minnesota prior to "this sanctuary city, Islamist immigration" would make a cat laugh. We're hoping that even Dan Fabian can see the problem.

In fact, Minnesota enjoyed a robust reputation for sex trafficking during the 1970s, years before the concept of "sanctuary city" rose in the 1980s in response to the denial of refugees' requests for asylum from politically unstable countries in Central America.

Indeed, the state earned unwelcomed headlines for the "Minnesota Pipeline," in which teen-age girls ran away from small towns, were groomed by pimps and madams in the Twin Cities, then marketed to New York City and other points out-of-state.

But less sensational headlines and detailed accounts graced the New York Times. While some scholars have questioned the "pipeline" to New York City, their accounts nonetheless note that troubled girls fleeing small towns were recruited into underaged prostitution.

Instead, trafficking in under-aged girls was more diffuse geographically. In Money, Not New York, Lures Minnesota Prostitutes,(since the pimps were making the plans, they were the ones making the money, so the headline is unfortunate), the Times' Nathaniel Sheppard reported in 1977:

Although the number of young prostitutes from Minnesota who ply their trade in Manhattan is large, conversations here with police officers and prostitutes themselves suggest there is no formal network that channels women from Minneapolis into New York's redlight district.

New York, it appears from this examination, is but one of a dozen cities that may attract the women and their pimps. And rather than the highly publicized “pipeline” carrying girls from the Middle West to Eighth Avenue's seamy “Minnesota Strip,” the prostitutes are simply lured to the cities where their earning prospects are best. The so‐called pipeline flows in many directions, to wherever the money and the action are.

“A pimp may read or hear that some big convention is going on somewhere and tell a girl’ to hop on a bus, train or plane and meet him there,” said one St. Paul teen‐ager who at 19 is a veteran prostitute.

“First, he usually lets her work the streets or topless bars here and in small towns around the state and Iowa,” she said, “to learn the ropes and to make enough money to pay for them to get there.”

Sometimes the women go on their own, but more often they go on brutally enforced orders from their pimps, who set minimum daily earnings quotas that may range from $100 to $400, depending on the city, several young prostitutes said in interviews.

Juveniles have accounted for much of the increase in prostitution in Minneapolis, according to the police here. Of 60 prostitution arrests in 1970, for example, there were no juveniles involved and the average age of the women arrested was 25 years.

In 1976, however, juveniles accounted for 73 of the 389 women arrested for prostitution, dropping the average age of those arrested to 19.5 years. The police estimate that there are about 1,500 prostitutes in the Minneapolis‐St. Paul metropolitan area, which has a population of about 1.5 million people. About 25 percent of the prostitutes are 18 years of age or younger. . .

Don't forget the big push to normalize pedophilia isn't for the benefit of the LGBTQ community either, it is to eventually help a religious system where child brides are the norm, hence the rise in child sex trafficking.

We're hoping the House passes that bill and provides another tool to curb sex trafficking, regardless of this dubious logic. How bad is it? We'll leave readers with Representative Miller's comment:

Tim MillerI am a proud co-author on this bill. Abigail Whelan is one of the true Godly champions of conservatism in the MN House. To denigrate her character based on this bill is to ignore her record and how she lives her life. To know her is to know that if she authored this bill should give it credibility to its content. You, Don, have accused her of being paid off to author this bill. Shame on you. She personally had this written based on her convictions. Is it perfect? Perhaps not, but the legislative process refines.

This bill has very wide support. Why? Because 14 year old girls are being dragged into having sex with middle age guys, often married with kids of their own, and some pimp is making thousands of dollars daily off of them. This is happening in hotels and motels throughout the state. I personally do not like mandates by government on private businesses, but are you aware that even that industry is supporting this bill?

I have worked intensely on this issue for four years and I can tell you trafficking is very real in Minnesota. Attacking Abigail in this way tells me you do not understand the issue and have no intention of ever doing so.

It's not often we agree with either Whelan or Miller, but there you go.

UPDATE: The Minnesota House passed the bill without a dissenting vote.

Photo: The Facebook post. The activist goes on the say the bill would enrich Senator Abeler's wife.

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. . .That leak in the Keystone Pipeline spilled 5,000 barrels of crude oil — about 210,000 gallons, according to TransCanada, the pipeline’s owner. That made the spill one of the 20 largest onshore oil or petroleum product spills since 2010.

A spill that size gets attention.

A spill double that size should get our outrage — and greater scrutiny of the company in which we have put so much trust.

In fact, the Keystone oil spill in Marshall was nearly twice the size of those early-hour estimates from TransCanada.. . .

If South Dakotans didn’t think the pipeline leak was serious in November, the April number should have been a massive wake-up call. . ..

During the course of reporting, we learned that state officials did not necessarily have the expertise needed to fully understand massive oil pipelines or spills. We heard surprise, and we heard concern.

Now we need to hear how South Dakotans will be protected: our land, our money and our lives.

A “pipeline moratorium” bill was considered — and killed — during the 2018 legislative session. . . .

Read the rest at the Aberdeen American. The editorial is directed to South Dakotans, but Minnesotans should also take notice.

UPDATE: As reported by the Star Tribune, Gov. Mark Dayton said he would veto any legislation that cuts the Public Utilities Commission out of the process!

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In one of the more controversial moves of the legislative session, a key House committee is considering a bill granting immediate approval of the Enbridge Energy Line 3 project.

The bill, HF 3759 (Fabian – R), would terminate the Public Utilities Commission’s ongoing review and permit process for the proposed pipeline, and immediately grant the Canadian multinational energy transportation company full authority to build the pipeline on the company’s chosen route without further regulatory approvals from the state.

While FMR does not work on pipeline projects directly, we are concerned about a bill that would short-circuit an ongoing public review process that has included tens of thousands of public comments and hundreds of hours of expert testimony from both Enbridge Energy and intervening parties.

Dismissing an established regulatory review process and replacing it with a politically-motivated legislative overwrite ignores the concerns of communities, landowners, industries, and First Nations along the proposed route. It would likewise ignore the state’s own Commerce Department, which concluded that the project isn’t needed and won’t benefit Minnesota.

While serious questions remain about the need for the pipeline, its environmental and social justice implications and Enbridge Energy’s questionable plans to leave the old corroding pipe in the ground, those issues are beyond FMR’s area of expertise.

However, we remain deeply concerned that the proposed legislative intervention in an established public review and permitting process disrespects the views of all Minnesotans while granting special privileges to a single foreign-owned corporation unaccountable to the people of Minnesota. . . .

Photo: The Keystone I spill near Amherst, South Dakota. With Minnesota use common sense and keep the PUC review with its own pipeline issues?

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After eight years of displeasure with the presidency of Barack Obama and faced with a choice between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, Dennis Schminke of Austin, Minn., didn’t have to think hard about how he would vote in 2016. A retired corporate manager, a staunch conservative and a county Republican official, he supported the New York businessman.

Since then, there has not been a day that Schminke wished that Clinton, rather than Trump, were president. But week by week, month by month, as he has watched the events of Trump’s presidency, he has become increasingly conflicted and concerned about what he has seen. The turmoil, he said, has often left him feeling “motion sick.”

By early spring, he expressed a different sentiment. He had not fully broken, but he was no longer as emotionally invested in the president or a reconstituted Trumpian Republican Party. “I find myself drawing back a bit,” he said.

Schminke lives in a section of the Upper Midwest that responded enthusiastically to Trump, as a candidate and an incoming president. In this region, the Trump presidency is viewed as both reassuring and exhausting, a welcome poke in the eye at elites and the Washington power structure coupled with endless and often self-inflicted distractions. What is also apparent is that, 16 months into Trump’s presidency, many voters here have recalibrated their feelings and intensity of support for the man they backed in 2016. . . .

While some southwest Minnesota farmers are frustrated with the increasing tariff war with China, they are not ready to blame the Trump administration for any agriculture downturn.

The trade dispute with China is now escalating as Chinese buyers started canceling orders for U.S. soybeans. That’s a trend that could threaten the financial stability for area farmers if it continues.

At the same time, farmers in China are being encouraged to plant more soy, apparently to help offset any shortfall from the United States.

“I’m really disgusted with the way things are going,” Roger Dale, Hanley Falls Farmer and Yellow Medicine County Soybean Growers Association director, said Wednesday. “Some people blame President (Donald) Trump, but just look at what the Chinese have done to us.

“It irritates me that so much stuff (our citizens use) is made over there and only our ag products are shipped over there,” Dale said. “The tariffs should benefit everybody in the U.S., even produce more jobs for our people who need them. The cost of living might go up a little, but if we don’t sell our ag products, we could lose a lot of farmers. . . .

“The Chinese aren’t willing to buy U.S. soybeans with a 25 percent tax hanging over their head,” said Dan Basse, president of AgResource, an agricultural research and advisory firm. “You just don’t want the risk.”

China typically buys most of its soybeans from South American nations such as Brazil and Argentina during spring and early summer. It shifts to U.S. soybeans in the fall. As a result, for now, the cutbacks from the United States are relatively small.

But should they persist, it could cause real pain to U.S. farmers. Roughly 60 percent of U.S. soybeans are shipped to China.

There might also be a political impact: Three of the top five soybean-exporting states — Iowa, Indiana and Nebraska — voted for Trump in 2016. Illinois, the top soybean exporter, and Minnesota, the third-largest, backed Hillary Clinton. . . .

It's a hyper-local look at the soybean growers' dilemma, but the farmers and ag industry employees seem to lay fault at the feet of their customers, rather than their president.

That evening, the members of the local Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party gathered for their monthly meeting. With a reporter present, they replayed what had happened in the 2016 election. Many opinions were offered, including that the news media weren’t as rigorous in covering Trump as it was Clinton. One activist offered a conclusion shared by many Democrats in the Midwest. “The 60-year-old white male has been forgotten,” he said.

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If you appreciate our posts and original analysis, you can mail contributions (payable to Sally Jo Sorensen, 600 Maple Street, Summit SD 57266) or use the paypal button in the upper right hand corner of this post. Those wishing to make a small ongoing monthly contribution should click on the paypal subscription button.

An invasive insect that's killed more than 60 million ash trees across the United States has arrived in South Dakota for the first time.

Sioux Falls and state officials held a news conference Wednesday afternoon to announce that the emerald ash borer has been discovered in the city — the first confirmed infestation in the state of South Dakota.

John Ball, an entomologist with the South Dakota State University Extension Office, said an arborist working in northern Sioux Falls reported finding what looked like emerald ash borer symptoms, and their diagnosis was confirmed Wednesday morning.

"This was an inevitability," he said. "The fact was that it was going to appear here eventually, and it happened to be this year."

South Dakota is the 33rd state with confirmed emerald ash borer cases.

Since receiving the report from the arborist earlier this month, Ball said they've identified about 250 trees in northern Sioux Falls that have the disease. And with more than 84,000 ash trees throughout the city, he said there's no question it will spread across Sioux Falls over the next 10 to 12 years.

In response, an "Emergency Plant Pest Quarantine" has been declared, restricting the movement of all ash materials in Minnehaha County, areas north of Highway 18 in Lincoln County and east of Highway 19 in Turner County.

We'll be on the look out for the EAB to make its way from Minnesota or up I-29 to Summit.

Photo: The evil beetle, the emerald ash borer.

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ST. PAUL, MN – Governor Mark Dayton today vetoed HF 3280, a bill regarding sulfate standards for waters used to produce wild rice. The following is a statement from Governor Dayton.

“Previously, I have urged Legislators to find a workable solution to Minnesota’s wild rice sulfate standards that would bring communities and businesses throughout Minnesota the regulatory certainty they need. Unfortunately, the bill sent to me, which would abolish any sulfate standard, is an extreme overreach. It would violate the federal Clean Water Act and ensure continued uncertainty from inevitable litigation.

“In 2011, the Legislature directed the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency to develop a new sulfate standard, one that would both protect wild rice and also support jobs and economic development. In the remaining 12 days of this Legislative Session, I urge Legislators to forge that kind of responsible solution, which respects the federal law, provides needed regulatory certainty, and protects our priceless wild rice and water resources.”

To read Governor Dayton’s veto letter to Speaker of the House Kurt Daudt, CLICK HERE.

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May 08, 2018

Near the end of a House floor session that included adopting the Conference Committee Report on HF3280, a bill that nullify the state's existing wild rice water quality sulfate standard (which the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe opposed), the four Native American Women serving in the Minnesota House read the governor's proclamation declaring Saturday, May 5, Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women Awareness Day.

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May 07, 2018

In the Minnesota House floor session on Monday, the body adopted the Conference Committee Report on HF3280, in a 79-48 vote.

The bill would nullify the state's existing wild rice water quality sulfate standard and require the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) to begin a new rulemaking process were the agency to move forward with adoption of a new standard.

In the brief debate on the bill-which is opposed by the state's Ojibwe tribes for whom the state grain has deep cultural and sacred importance and many who care about the state's water quality, but supported by mining interests--state representative Rick Hansen, DFL-S. St Paul, noted that the governor had asked the conference committee for more changes to the bill that had been delivered. The bill is likely for a veto.

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